..Several studies, including one recently published in BMC Biology, have now taken a genomic approach to this classical problem, providing insights into how selection operates differentially across the life cycle...

..Cases in which parallel mutations have produced parallel trait modifications in particular suggest that some phenotypic changes are more likely to result from cis-regulatory mutations than from coding mutations...

..Convergence in regulatory gene expression domains is probably more common than generally acknowledged, and can arise for several different reasons...

Developmental regulatory genes and echinoderm evolution

G A WrayDepartment of Ecology and Evolution, State University of New York, Stony Brook, New York 11794 5245, USASyst Biol 49:28-51. 2000

..Cases of likely convergence in expression domains suggest caution when using developmental regulatory genes to make inferences about homology among morphological structures of distantly related taxa...

J R StoneDepartment of Ecology and Evolution, State University of New York at Stony Brook, USAMol Biol Evol 18:1764-70. 2001

..Even combinations of two new binding sites evolve very quickly. We predict that local point mutations continually generate considerable genetic variation that is capable of altering gene expression...

..Additionally, the results emphasize the importance of examining more than one cell line, the existence of multiple functional variants in a given promoter region and the presence of non-additive cis-interactions...

..The allele frequencies of this binding site represent local adaptation to diverse pathogenic challenges; disease states associated with the common derived allele are side-effects of positive selection on other IL4 functions...

Christopher J LoweDepartment of Ecology and Evolution, State University of New York at Stony Brook, 11732, USAEvol Dev 4:111-23. 2002

..Caution should be used when making generalizations about gene expression and function based on a single species, which may not accurately reflect developmental processes and life histories of the phyla to which it belongs...

Promoter regions of many neural- and nutrition-related genes have experienced positive selection during human evolution

..In combination with the rich history of behavioral, ecological, and physiological work on natural primate populations, genetic approaches promise to provide a compelling picture of primate evolution in the past and in the present day...

Growth and patterning are evolutionarily dissociated in the vestigial wing discs of workers of the red imported fire ant, Solenopsis invicta

..invicta because patterning in these discs is conserved, whereas their growth trajectories are not. The evolutionary dissociation of growth and patterning may be an important feature of gene networks that underlie polyphenic traits...

G A WrayDepartment of Ecology and Evolution, State University of New York, Stony Brook, New York 11794 5245, USACurr Opin Genet Dev 8:675-80. 1998

..These dissociations have interesting and important implications for understanding the genetic basis for evolutionary change in morphology...

Identification of asteroid genera with species capable of larval cloning

K Emily KnottDepartment of Ecology and Evolution, State University of New York, Stony Brook 11794 5245, USABiol Bull 204:246-55. 2003

..Additionally, we note that cloning occurs regularly and in multiple ways within species that are capable of cloning, emphasizing the need for further investigation of the role of larval cloning in the ecology and evolution of asteroids...

..12 for eubacterial genomes and -0.06 for archaeal genomes, similar to that of codon bias. Our results suggest that both coding and noncoding sequences are constrained by selection to avoid specific regions of sequence space...

Molecular phylogeny of naidid worms (Annelida: Clitellata) based on cytochrome oxidase I

Alexandra E BelyDepartment of Ecology and Evolution, State University of New York at Stony Brook, Stony Brook, NY 11794 5245, USAMol Phylogenet Evol 30:50-63. 2004

..The simplest form of fission, architomy (fragmentation), occurs in two of the most basally branching naidid genera, and may represent the plesiomorphic condition for naidids...